Spellbound!
It’s a kinda magic: Amelie Van Tass and Thommy Ten at the Nelum Pokuna. Pic by M.A. Pushpa Kumara
In the final round of America’s Got Talent, Season 11, ‘The Clairvoyants’ were portrayed as having met each other in an epic moment of epiphany. Their eyes lock, their umbrellas and hoodies fall off in the rain, and they are drawn to each other with magnetism.
This may seem stagecraft for the TV show, but the truth is actually quite similar, even if it didn’t happen to the same operatic tempo.
Amélie Van Tass once got a call out of the blue to stand in as helper to Thommy Ten in an amateur TV show. But what promised to be two hours in a Viennese studio expanded to a much deeper commitment. At the end of the show they had not only discovered electricity between them, but also that they were privy to each other’s private natures so much so they could communicate without looking at each other.
It was uncanny as befits the birth of new magic. They would later discover they had ‘met each other long before they met’: they were delivered in the same hospital, had lived in the same places, “and been at the same parties- though missing each other’.
So began the journey for two of today’s best known mentalists, its latest leg having played out at the Nelum Pokuna theatre last Thursday- the grand show presented by Cinnamon Life. When we met Amelie and Thommy at Cinnamon Lakeside the day before, a long flight had taken its toll on them but the couple drew radiant energy from each other. Their chemistry was a pleasure to drink in.
Thommy began performing magic at ten. He would cut a rope and put it together, or whisk out of thin air a coin he had made vanish, though today he plays host and funny entertainer mostly, while Amelie seems to do most of the mind reading.
From what Amelie reveals, a part of mentalism seems tuning into this subtle realm of gut feeling and intuition, and widening it (like a turtle may- on sand with its flippers). But it is a process without an end- you can push the perimeters further and further. A big part of it is also in the theatrics and showmanship, though there are “many other elements involved”- Amelie says.
There were many mind-blowing acts performed at Nelum Pokuna that night- the core of a number of them was that paper, deposited safely on stage, sealed with wax, before the beginning of the acts, later found to contain answers to random questions asked from audience members during the act. People were also asked on stage, and startling psychic (even supernatural) connections between complete strangers were revealed. The jelly bean trick had audiences amazed. The atmosphere was electric with interaction and gasps.
In constructing acts, the couple draws inspiration from their favourite films and music. But mostly what they do is to take ‘everyday magic’ to the next level. “You know those moments when we suddenly think of a long-forgotten friend, and the next second he calls you? We make things like this a little more impossible and bring them on stage.”
The most astounding mind reading was when blind-folded Amelie correctly guessed some twenty objects borrowed far away from the audience members- among them cough drops with their expiry date, the serial number of a lady’s 1,000 rupee note and a book with the page where it had been marked. Thommy held a lady’s hand while Amelie still on stage correctly gave her birthday.
Reading minds, numbers and confounding the audience: Thomas and Amelie
It was with finesse like this that The Clairvoyants won the title of The World Champions of Mentalism, not awarded for 30 years because there was no one up to scratch.
Nonetheless, there may be extremely rare moments when the spells don’t hold, and the reading gets garbled. But this doesn’t fuss them one bit. “It makes things more relatable for the audience, and shows that we are after all human- not machines doing things.”
Being on America’s Got Talent was their big break. While normally they would take months or even years to put acts together, AGT demanded three acts in a couple of days, including that mesmerizing water act in the final performance where Amelie read minds submerged in a tank. They learnt that pressure can push the pedal on creativity- that racing against a deadline can make inspiration come thick and fast.
While they have bowed, beaming, to standing ovations at venues from the Sydney Opera House and the Palace Theatre in Broadway to Planet Hollywood, The Clairvoyants maintain that the place, however ritzy or grand, is secondary to the experience, which is different each night.
“The fun and the audience is what matters,” says Thommy. Adds Amelie, “The most beautiful moment- it’s when the magic happens in people’s eyes.”